


I Would Kill, To Save A Life

by Velocity_Owl87



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Anakin Skywalker Doesn't Turn to the Dark Side, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Awkward Conversations, Career Change, Difficult Decisions, Gen, Introspection, Multi, Murder, Sacrifice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-17
Updated: 2018-04-17
Packaged: 2019-04-24 07:17:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14350590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velocity_Owl87/pseuds/Velocity_Owl87
Summary: Padme knew all about making difficult decisions and weighing the consequences. She was a career politician after all.So when she found out all that Senator Palpatine had planned for not just the Republic, but for Anakin, she knew what she had to do.





	I Would Kill, To Save A Life

**Author's Note:**

> Someone posted an idea for a Padme AU where she is the one that discovers who the Sith is and how she brings him down. So the idea wouldn't let go and here we are.

Padme heard them run into the room and stop to take in the scene in front of them only for a brief moment.

It was so fast that she didn’t register them coming further into the room.

Yet it wasn’t Anakin that reached her first, but Obi Wan.

He was the one that took the blaster from her unresisting hand and cupped her face between calloused hands.

Anakin was the one that took the sight of the blood splattered walls and the body of the former Senator Palpatine lying sprawled out with an expression of shock on his face. Anakin’s own face was struggling to contain his emotions, which ranged from grief, shock, and surprise. The Jedi mask was off and he couldn’t contain himself.

He couldn’t understand what she had done and she knew that if it wasn’t for Obi Wan. he might have done something drastic.

Yet despite the fact that she didn’t know if she had damaged their marriage, she didn’t regret putting that blaster bolt between that evil old man’s eyes. After all he had pretended to be, hiding his filth and corruption underneath a paternal guise...Padme felt her skin crawl at the idea of all the hours she had spent in his company.

How many hours her Ani had spent in his company. Had he already corrupted her husband?

Padme glanced at Anakin and he turned his face as he struggled to contain the complexity of the emotions that assaulted him in that moment.

She was all too aware of what it looked like and she didn’t care.

She had done the only thing that had been left to her once she had found everything. She had seen how deep his deceptions lay and what he had done and would do to cover his tracks. What he had been doing in order to win her Anakin over to him.

That last was what she couldn’t let go. Couldn’t tolerate knowing his plans for the young man she loved.

The father of her unborn child who was standing there, trying understand.

She didn’t have any of the Force mastery that he did, but he was projecting so much that she could sense him. Sense his confusion and loss and betrayal. She knew he felt that. Especially with how he couldn’t stop staring at the dessicated corpse of that filthy, despicable and loathsome creature whose husk lay sprawled out on the once pristine chamber floor.

“Padme?”

Obi Wan’s gentle voice cut into her thoughts and she turned her focus onto him.

“What happened here? Did he try to molest you? Was it an argument?”

He tried, filling the spaces with the words that Anakin was too overwrought to voice himself.

It was procedure, she knew. She was well aware of what would come next and she welcomed it.

Nothing mattered anymore. She had done her duty and she had saved the galaxy. Saved Anakin and if she were going to be tried and put to death, she had that at least to assuage the fear of what would come next.

“He was an evil and corrupt bastard that needed to die.”

Was her reply, shocking the usually unflappable Obi Wan. Anakin made a strange strangled sound at that.

“What? How can you say that about the Senator? Wasn’t he your mentor?”

Anakin finally managed to speak.

“He may have worn that mask, but he is what I said he was as well.”

Obi Wan frowned at her reply, turning to Anakin, was looking at her as if he didn’t really know who it was that he was looking at.

“How? Do you have the evidence?”

He asked, turning away and taking in the sight of the now dead senator in a way he hadn’t before.

“It’s all on the holonet. But the rest, I have here.”

She pulled out the thumbdrive of all of the plans that had made her finally make the decision that led them to be standing there.

Obi Wan nodded and took it from her.

“I’m so sorry, Padme.”

Anakin choked out as he read her rights and Obi Wan cuffed her.

She smiled a tight smile at him.

“I know.”

That was the last bit of conversation they had before she was whisked away to the judiciary.

~*~*~*~*~

She sat in the cell for what felt like days, but was luckily hours.

The baby was only a suggestion of flutters inside, but she still stroked her belly to soothe them. The cell wasn’t exactly pleasant and she knew that the baby felt her own worry and apprehension. She had taken a gamble and was now waiting to see if it was going to be a winning one, or a losing one.

She stood up when she heard footsteps and waited to see who it was that they had sent.

To her surprise, it was Anakin and Obi Wan again standing outside of her cell.

“Are you escorting me to my trial?”

She asked, moving forward and looking for the summons, the cuffs.

But they carried nothing like that.

And as she looked closer, neither of them had their sabers hanging at their belts.

Fear crept into her belly when she saw this, prompting her to look up and see that they weren’t wearing their robes. In fact, they were dressed in their native clothing: Stewjon and Tatooine. The light colours and the heavily embroidered coat seemed odd on both of them. Yet she had a feeling she was going to have to get used to seeing this.

“There won’t be a trial. There’s too much fall out and clean up over what you did and released into the galaxy.”

Anakin replied as Obi Wan keyed in the code and the door to her cell opened. She was free.

“Am I still a Senator?”

Anakin nodded, coming closer, but still not quite within arm’s reach.

She had expected it, but it still hurt. They would have a long talk. She would show him what Palpatine had compiled on him. All his notes on how to better manipulate him and dim his goodness. How to play on his fears to cause him to fall. How to destroy him from the inside out.

Worse, the designs for that hideous black armour he intended to trap Anakin in. He’d never be free of it and that, to Padme, had been the decider.

She would have presented the evidence and left him to be judged.

But hurting Anakin to twist him into a monster? She couldn’t bear it. Or risk it.

So she had surprised him in his office, bringing some obscure motion or other as her reason to come. He had welcomed her with far too much alacrity. Padme had often guessed he lusted after her. Just like a dirty old man lusted over young, pale flesh that they could stain with their dirty fingers and leave ruined forever.

She had been revulsed, but she needed his eager, grasping fingers onto her. Just long enough for her to draw out the blaster and fire the bolt in between his eyes.

“They won’t risk angering the public. Not when everything has come out. The Separatists are suing for peace. The Clones are getting the chips taken out and actually formed into an Army with pay and rights.”

Obi Wan smiled tersely. “You single handedly solved the Galaxy’s major problems. No one would dare go against you.”

Padme nodded. “So where are you taking me?”

“Your husband and I are escorting you to Naboo. The Senate thought it wise if you took a leave for now.”

Obi Wan replied lightly, but she could read between the lines: They were grateful, but they couldn’t be seen to condone her actions. Some months away from the public eye would go quite far to smooth things over.

“Anakin, I understand. But you, Master Kenobi?”

Obi Wan smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

“That’s too long of a tale to tell.Suffice to say that my choice and Anakin’s has been made and we don’t have time to lose.”

He held out and arm for her to take and Anakin flanked her left side.

They moved out of the prison towards the docks and her ship and Padme couldn’t help but to feel that this was the last time she would be in Coruscant.

And yet, she couldn’t find it in herself to regret it.

She glanced at Anakin, who had moved closer, his hand slipping into hers as they walked.

Not when she had him with her.

She had fulfilled her duty and if it cost her a seat on the Senate and the chance to be in Coruscant, so be it.

She had done her duty.

END.


End file.
